This application relates to optical resonators such as optical whispering-gallery-mode (“WGM”) resonators and their fabrication.
An optical whispering-gallery-mode (“WGM”) resonator is specially shaped to support whispering gallery (“WG”) modes. These resonator modes represent optical fields confined in an interior region close to the surface of the resonator due to the total internal reflection at the boundary. Microspheres with diameters from few tens of microns to several hundreds of microns have been used to form compact optical WGM resonators. Such spherical resonators include at least a portion of the sphere that comprises the sphere's equator. The resonator dimension is generally much larger than the wavelength of light so that the optical loss due to the finite curvature of the resonators is small. As a result, a high quality factor, Q, may be achieved in such resonators. Some microspheres with sub-millimeter dimensions have been demonstrated to exhibit high quality factors for light waves, ranging from 103 to 109 for quartz microspheres. Hence, optical energy, once coupled into a whispering gallery mode, can circulate within the WGM resonator with a long photon life time. The capability of producing high Q values makes the WGM resonators useful for many optical applications, including optical filtering, optical modulation, optical delay, optical sensing, compact lasers, and opto-electronic oscillators.